A Movement in Every Direction
Legacies of the Great Migration

Published by Yale University Press Published in association with the Baltimore Museum of Art and the Mississippi Museum of Art 

Contemporary artists and writers reflect on the Great Migration and the ways that it continues to inform the Black experience and culture in America. During the Great Migration (1915–70), African Americans left their home in the South to escape racial violence in search and pursuit of economic and educational opportunities and freedom from the oppression of Jim Crow. 

In this second volume, the multiplicity of voices and perspectives is showcased through newly commissioned artworks by Akea, Mark Bradford, Zoë Charlton, Larry W. Cook, Torkwase Dyson, Theaster Gates Jr., Allison Janae Hamilton, Leslie Hewitt, Steffani Jemison, Robert Pruitt, Jamea Richmond-Edwards, and Carrie Mae Weems. Themes of identity, familial archives, self reliance, and self perseverance are explored through the artist’s practices and reflections. The design of the book holds spaces for varying interpretations, with heavy emphasis on uplifting and highlighting the artist’s work and methodologies of making.